


Come Back to the End

by WhatEvenAmI



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Based on a Tumblr Post, Bucky Barnes Feels, Canon Divergence - Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Confusion, Crying, Cryogenics, Dissociation, Everything Hurts, Fear, Feels, Gen, Grief, Guilt, I'm Sorry, I'm awful, Inspired By Tumblr, Mental Breakdown, Pain, Sad, Steve Feels, Tumblr Prompt, What-If, poor steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-18
Updated: 2015-07-15
Packaged: 2018-04-04 22:11:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4154844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhatEvenAmI/pseuds/WhatEvenAmI
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>Steve stands at the window, tears blurring and warping the first sight of his best friend in seventy years.</em>
</p><p>While searching through what's left of HYDRA's property, Steve and Natasha make a horrible discovery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Saw [this](http://lauralot89.tumblr.com/post/120984167911/okay-so-i-had-a-really-unoriginal-idea-for-a-fic) on Tumblr and ideas happened. I know I came a little late to this pain party, but I brought extra helpings of tears, so that's nice, right?

When consciousness first begins seeping in, he's never very aware of the cold.

That's because he cannot feel, not much, not yet. Only the ice at his core, the sluggish, muffled thumping of his half-frozen heart. The sound is so loud when everything else is silent. The cold is deep inside, an ache in his stomach and lungs. There is no thought and little feeling. These are the rare moments of peace.

Then comes the noise, the mechanisms of the tank brought alive to bring him alive. There's the rhythmic sound of air being pumped into his lungs, the vibrating hum of the defroster, the shockingly loud hiss as the vacuum-sealed door begins to release. That one always jolts his brain, that's what fully wakes him.

He's learned not to open his eyes at first. Even if they weren't sealed shut with ice crystals, the light would cause pain after indeterminate periods spent in complete darkness. As he gradually comes to life he feels the full extent of the half-death that is his constant condition, his frigid body chilled through, his skin rigid and bitingly cold. He'd be shivering if his muscles were in working order.

Then comes the first hint of unease as the tank door swings open. Light floods against his eyelids and voices echo into the tube, surrounding him _—_ the  _wrong_ voices, he thinks, though from procedure to procedure it's hard to be sure. Still, he thinks he should feel familiarity for at least  _one_ presence, some deference to a senior handler or a commander. His programming is responding to none of them.

Could he have become nonfunctional? Has something inside him failed to respond correctly?

Worse, has he fallen into enemy hands?

He must control his distress; it increases his heartbeat at a dangerous rate, surging painfully against its induced stasis. _Compose. Collect. Gather information and process_. But his processing facilities are not fully operational yet. Only emotional processes are responding. This isn't good.

His ears, working properly now, register the echoes off the walls of the room. Vague dimensions form; the _location_  is familiar.

His misgivings are affirmed when his numb and rubbery body collapses, pitching forward out of the tank. There is no impact; midway down he is caught and lowered to the floor. Still, even the most inexperienced handlers know better than to risk damage to their weapon. There should have been steady, practiced hands waiting to guide him to the table. He should be lying there to defrost, his condition assessed while his body restarts itself. Instead he lies crumpled and disoriented on the ground.

And something else is wrong. He's registering damage; spasms of pain force their way through the ice frozen into his muscles. Hot blades spike through his lungs with every labored breath. Vaguely he senses hands pulling at him; he is slumped against another man, swaying, pressure squeezing at his ribs. In the man's tight grip, desperately awaiting maintenance, he begins to convulse. He is not meant to fear, so why is he so deeply confused and so very afraid?

The asset recoils when the echoing screams begin.

* * *

"You have to put him back."

Steve barely registers the words long enough to get out a "No," before turning his attention back to the ice-cold and blue-tinged figure shivering in his arms. He doesn't care who Natasha says he is or what he's done, doesn't care about anything right now aside from the fact that this man is _never_ going back into that godforsaken tank. He's never letting go, never, ever again.

He's so _cold_ , the aching frigidity taking hold throughout Steve's body like he's nothing but ninety pounds of bone once again. Steve keeps taking on the chill and Bucky's _still_ shivering, icewater seeping through his clothes. He only holds his friend tighter, determined to bring him alive again, but Natasha's getting louder, grabbing at his shoulder.

"You have to put him back! Steve, you'll kill him, do you understand? You pulled him out too quickly, his body can't take it, and if you don't get him back in  _he will die—Steve!_ " 

Steve's mind just keeps saying  _no, no, no_ and he's holding Bucky tighter, eyes burning,  _Bucky, I'm so sorry, I didn't know—_

A stinging slap jerks his head to the side and the world rights itself. Natasha's staring, wary and tense, waiting. Steve shudders and bursts into tears.

"I know," she's all soft words and gentle hands now, easing Bucky up. He's rattling and gasping, arms flopping at his sides. "I know, but Steve, I've seen this before. He'll need more time for his system to adjust."

Steve's shaking as Natasha pulls Bucky's cold limp body from his arms. "I promise, we'll get him out as soon as the tank's got his body working again. I know," she repeats, anticipating his clumsy reflexive grab and batting his hand away. But Bucky's  _fighting_ now, groaning and jerking and so clearly  _not wanting to go back in that tank._ Steve feels the spiraling emotions rising, knows he's becoming hysterical, but he can't _help_ it. "Bucky!" he's crying out as Natasha heaves his friend's twitching body back into the tube, " _Bucky_!"

When the lid slams shut Steve flinches; it's like watching him fall all over again. 

Natasha moves to intercept him, grabbing his arm and squeezing. "Steve!"

"I won't," he manages, "I know, I won't." But the self-restraint it takes  _not_ to...

She's rubbing at his arm, offering comfort, but he can't feel it. He's numb and cold from holding Bucky.

While the loathsome tank powers up again, humming and pumping bursts of air, Natasha pulls out her phone to call transport. Steve stands, transfixed, staring through the tiny viewing window at his friend's pale, groggy face. His dull eyes flutter and slide shut as he relaxes once again into ice-induced sleep. Steve knows that feeling, can feel the memory of crystals forming, stilling his lungs. Oh, hell, it's like they killed Bucky over and over and over again.

Steve stands at the window, tears blurring and warping the first sight of his best friend in seventy years.  _What did they do to you? What did they make you do?_

He doesn't realize he's been repeating it like a mantra until the frost creeps over the inside of the viewing window, sealing Bucky in and shutting him out.

Steve's not crying anymore. He's staring at the unyieldingly fogged-out oval, completely and entirely numb.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _This time there's dread from the moment he begins to wake._
> 
> Natasha wants to be there for Steve. And for the frozen man in the cryogenic tube. She's trying to keep herself together while her world begins to crumble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got a couple suggestions for more of this, so here it is.

Steve's gotten ahold of himself, but Natasha's still a bit shaken.

She's never seen him that undone, his pain loud and so disarmingly intimate. The vulnerability of the moment has her rattled. After boarding the Quinjet he sat close to her, trembling, letting her squeeze his arm and murmur the occasional reassurance. It was a moment of raw and open weakness from a man who has to constantly project the image of unwavering strength. She's struck, once again, by the fact that he  _trusts_ her.

That thought leaves her even more rattled than the man who sleeps in the humming cryo tank, now lying on the floor of the Quinjet while Natasha tries to figure out how to bring him safely into consciousness. She's seen this before, yes, but never actually  _done_ it. 

Cryogenic storage is usually used in research labs to preserve living tissue during long-term experiments. Occasionally she's seen it used to prolong someone's life until adequate medical care is found, but not usually. Only the strongest and most resilient can survive the half-life in ice.

She's seen cryogenic storage used one other time. She thinks of Steve's trust and her conscience twinges. She told him about the bullet hole through her abdomen and how it got there, but she hasn't told him the full story between herself and the man in the tank. She may have to, though, and soon.

He sits cross-legged at the viewing window, quiet and composed now. "I'm sorry." his eyes flick towards her. "For before, I just—"

"It's fine, you don't have to explain." It's so much easier when you're kicking ass or working a control panel or carrying someone to safety. When all you can do is sit by and wait, that's the worst and most helpless feeling there is. His pre-existing mountain of guilt probably wasn't helping, either.

 She turns up the dial labeled 'oxygen' and runs through her admittedly limited knowledge of human biological systems. "This is as far as I can take it."

"Natasha—"

"We didn't bring him all this way just for me to screw this up and kill him," she says bluntly, "We need to get him to someone who understands this technology and how it corresponds to his biology. And I'm sorry, but we need him contained until we understand where his head is at." 

 _Contained_ may have been a poor choice in wording. Steve glares first at her, then at the tank. "I meant we need to find a place where it's safe to get him out."

"If what you said about him is true, if we let them lock him up, they may not let him go. And I'm _not_ letting that happen."

"You may be right," she says, "which is why we're not taking him to SHIELD. Oh, by the way, they're probably gonna notice we've taken the Quinjet off course soon enough. So, you know. Be ready." She shrugs like her world isn't disintegrating bit by bit. Her belief in SHIELD—just one more thing woven from illusion and deceit. How much does she have left to stand on before it all falls through?

That, and she's as reluctant as Steve to hand this man over. She has her own reasons.

Absently, she rubs her fingers over the viewing window of the tank. Biting cold seeps unhindered through the glass, making her hand ache. "Stark and Banner can help. And Stark's not afraid of pissing off SHIELD."

Conflict sweeps through his face. Sometimes she wants to tell him he's too damn easy to read. If she wanted to, she could say his next sentence right along with him. "I'm not leaving his side, understand? Not until I know he's safe. Not until  _he_ knows he's safe."

"Steve," she says quietly, "He may not remember things. He may be confused, he might see you as a threat. If you're going to stay with him, you need to be prepared for that."

He doesn't know what to do, she can see it all too well. "We'll figure it out as we go," she promises, mentally bracing herself. If she's going to tell this story, it'll be on her own terms, not because something beyond her control forced her hand. "But there are some things you need to know."

She keeps herself steady, makes herself look him in the eye while she talks. Her face is carefully blank, but his, damn it, his reflects all the feelings filling the spaces between her words, everything she doesn't need to say.

Too goddamned easy to read.

* * *

Gradual awareness creeps in.

This time there's dread from the moment he begins to wake. The fact that he remembers the  _last_ time is, in and of itself, cause for alarm. 

He is held at a distance from full consciousness, a speck of life in the dark vastness of his mind. He remains this way for so long that he begins to think he will never be allowed to wake up, but maybe that wouldn't be so bad. He's not with HYDRA and he doesn't know what will be done with him now, but he's too tired and half-dead to care. Maybe he'll rest safely here forever in the dark cold peace.

But then the mechanisms around him begin churning once more. And gradually, though he tries to resist it, in comes the cold and the awakening and the fear.

He should control the fear. He cannot control the fear. And what's worse is that he does not hear the tank door opening. He does not feel the shift from vertical to horizontal that would set him on his feet. Everything is wrong. And every wrong thing brings in another wave of panic.

He is trapped inside this small metal tube. He cannot force the lid. He doesn't know when he learned this or how many times it took, but he remembers the futility of pushing against the door. Even when put to the test against the metal arm, it will not open.

So, terrified, he waits for the ice to melt, water slowly pooling beneath him. Waits as the machine starts pumping his aching lungs and he begins to feel the sting of the thaw in his skin. His body trembles and his eyes slide open, squinting against the sudden assault of light.

The inside of the tank is not a sight he sees often. Usually, by the time his eyes can be opened, he has already been led to the table to defrost. He doubts he's in the room with the table now. Through the frost-blurred viewing window his surroundings appear wrong.

There's nothing he can do about it. His body will not be operating at full capacity for hours; right now it maintains a sluggish version of the basic functions necessary to keep him alive. His breath feels cold on his clumsy lips. His trembling fingers barely move when he tries to raise a hand. He cannot fight his captors, whoever they may be.

The frost over the viewing window is beginning to clear, light filtering brighter into the tank. Through the fogged glass, vague shapes pass in and out of view. Resigned to whatever comes next, he lies back, shivering in the icy puddle, and waits.

But when the door hisses its release and swings open, the Soldier finds himself staring up at the face of a single man.

He's right; it's not someone he recognizes. Until the man's face falls into a certain _expression_  and the Soldier's world misaligns in a way he cannot begin to describe.

He doesn't know what the face means, doesn't know why it makes his heart ache with a pain entirely different from the surging pulses fighting off ice.

He has been taken and he does not know where he is or who he's with and seldom has he been so helpless and the man's face that hurts him in places still slow and frozen, and his icy stomach is falling, he is falling, always, he has been falling forever and ever, falling and so very cold and far away.


End file.
